Excerpt:

ITHACA, New York (AP) -- The thought of a driverless, computer-guided car
transporting people where they want to go on demand is a futuristic notion
to some.

To Jacob Roberts, podcars -- or PRTs, for personal rapid transit --
represent an important component in the here-and-now of transportation.

"It's time we design cities for the human, not for the automobile," said
Roberts, president of Connect Ithaca, a group of planning and building
professionals, activists and students committed to making this upstate New
York college town the first podcar community in the United States.

"In the podcar ... it creates the perfect blend between the privacy and
autonomy of the automobile with the public transportation aspect and, of
course, it uses clean energy," Roberts said.

With the oil crisis reaching a zenith and federal lawmakers ready to begin
fashioning a new national transportation bill for 2010, Roberts and his
colleagues think the future is now for podcars -- electric, automated,
lightweight vehicles that ride on their own network separate from other
traffic.

Unlike mass transit, podcars carry two to 10 passengers, giving travelers
the freedom and privacy of their own car while reducing the use of fossil
fuels, reducing traffic congestion and freeing up space now monopolized by
parking.

At stations located every block or every half-mile, depending on the need,
a rider enters a destination on a computerized pad, and a car would take
the person nonstop to the location. Stations would have slanted pull-in
bays so that some cars could stop for passengers, while others could
continue unimpeded on the main course.

"It works almost like an elevator, but horizontally," said Roberts, adding
podcar travel would be safer than automobile travel.

The podcar is not entirely new. A limited version with larger cars
carrying up to 15 passengers was built in 1975 in Morgantown, West
Virginia, and still transports West Virginia University students.

Next year, Heathrow Airport outside London will unveil a pilot podcar
system to ferry air travelers on the ground. Companies in Sweden, Poland
and Korea are already operating full-scale test tracks to demonstrate the
feasibility. Designers are planning a podcar network for Masdar City,
outside Abu Dhabi, which is being built as the world's first zero-carbon,
zero-waste city.

Meanwhile, more than a dozen cities in Sweden are planning podcar systems
as part of the country's commitment to be fossil-fuel-free by 2020, said
Hans Lindqvist, a councilman from Varmdo, Sweden, and chairman of Kompass,
an association of groups and municipalities behind the Swedish initiative.

"Today's transportation system is reaching a dead end," said Lindqvist, a
former member of the European parliament.

Cars have dominated the cityscape for nearly a century, taking up valuable
space while polluting the air, said Magnus Hunhammar, chief executive
officer of the Stockholm-based Institute for Sustainable Transportation,
the world's leading center on podcar technology.

CNN: City hopes to shuttle people in futuristic 'podcars'
http://www.cnn.com/2008/TECH/10/13/podcar.city.ap/index.html

Hey, Seattle, remember when we voted to fund and build a demonstration PRT
system back in 1996, in the same Sound Move vote that created Sound
Transit and built Central Link Light Rail?

Such a demonstration system would be small, useful, and dirt-cheap, so why
hasn't our leadership (including Sound Transit) done doodly-squat about
that part of the Sound Move vote yet? As an extra added bonus, with so
much software and engineering talent (and at least four PRT companies
either based in our area or having significant representation here),
Seattle could take a leadership role in an emerging market poised to
skyrocket when the London Heathrow PRT system opens to the public next
year.

Also note highly favorable PRT articles in the New York Times and Los
Angeles Times from last month:

The New York Times (via Balanced Transportation for Seattle): Ithaca Takes
a Hard Look at Pod Cars
http://finance.groups.yahoo.com/group/BalancedTransportationforSeattle/message/3\
751

The Los Angeles Times (via Balanced Transportation for Seattle): Seeding
the future with 'podcars'
http://finance.groups.yahoo.com/group/BalancedTransportationforSeattle/message/3\
758